March 21, 2021

Immigration attorney David Leopold confronted an angry Jeanine Pirro — that is, when he managed to get a word in edgewise — over her show's barrage of lies about migrants at the southern border, and the fact that she wants to distract from any of the accomplishments of the Biden administration.

The hosts on Fox really don't like it when anyone pierces the alternate reality bubble in which they're determined to keep their viewers living:

David Leopold, a nationally recognized immigration lawyer who served as a transition adviser to President Joe Biden, appeared on Pirro's program Justice With Judge Jeanine on Saturday evening to discuss the unfolding immigration situation at the southern border. Since Biden came to office, the U.S. has seen another surge in Latin American migrants—as it has routinely in recent years. Republicans have jumped on the increase in immigrants and asylum seekers to attack the new Democratic administration.

[...]

At the outset of the interview, Leopold pointed out that despite the "cruelty" of the Trump administration, migrants are "still coming" to the border. The former president's immigration policies were nationally and internationally condemned, particularly the highly controversial family separation policy which took away migrant children from their parents or guardians. Hundreds of those children still remain separated from their parents to this day.

"Why are they still coming? They're coming because this is not a Biden issue. This is something that's been going on in ebbs and flows for decades. And in fact, if you want to talk about a surge at the border—or a crisis..." Leopold said before being cut off by Pirro, as she took issue with his assessment.

After Leopold went back and forth over the number of migrants crossing the border, and the fact that there were more crossings back in 2019 than there are today, Pirro accused Leopold of having his "numbers wrong." (As the Newsweek article noted, Leopold's assertions were correct according to statistics from the U.S. Customs and Border Protection.)

Leopold responded, saying: "Jeanine, just because you say my numbers are wrong doesn't mean they're wrong."

"No, no they're facts!" Pirro replied. [...]

"They're not facts, Jeanine. Very few things I hear in this show tonight have been facts," Leopold said. "You said tonight that the border's open. That's not true."

After Leopold also rightfully noted that the right has been fear-mongering over migrants' crossings at the southern border to distract from Biden's agenda and COVID relief, Pirro angrily cut him off, telling him that she didn't tolerate lying on her show, which is a hoot, because if that were true, she'd have been off the air long ago because that's almost all her show's contents.

I'm really not sure why anyone on the left agrees to appear on shows like Pirro's at all, because you wind up like Leopold, being talked over and cut off the entire time, and her audience is unreachable. Despite the network's "fair and balanced" mantra, they really don't tolerate any actual liberals or advocates for Democratic policies on their programs. They prefer faux "Democrats" who repeat right wing talking points themselves, and who are happy to be ganged up on and used as props by the network.

Every once in a while, someone squeaks through and calls out the network on air for lying to their viewers constantly, but they don't allow that to happen very often, and when it does, it's met by the anger like you saw from Pirro in the clip above.

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